Basic Principles of Parenting

Introduction

Education is a task that parents naturally long to perform; from deep within themselves, parents yearn to educate their children properly. But education is also a science. It cannot be mastered after a bit of casual consideration or by depending on one’s hunches. Parents and teachers cannot rely on their intuition alone and assume that is enough and everything will turn out all right.

Nowadays, few people understand that education is a field that requires study and preparation. Unfortunately, often even teachers lack this awareness. In order to educate children properly, we must understand what education really means.

Sometimes we use methods that are counterproductive because we assume that they contribute to the educational process, but further investigation – especially keeping the long-term in mind – actually reveals that these techniques hinder education.

Finally, we must acknowledge that, ultimately, everything depends on Hashem. Even after careful study of all the components of education, we must still pray that Hashem will be satisfied with our efforts and grant us success.

Age Appropriateness

Our educational efforts during each stage must match the child’s true level of development. It is counterproductive to make demands of a child that, because of his age and level of development, he cannot possibly comprehend or fulfill. A child loathes and often shirks inappropriately sophisticated requests, and forcing him to attempt tasks that are beyond his ability could seriously damage his long-term spiritual development.

This concept presents a clear challenge to parents. Parents must recognize the child’s exact level of development and constantly adjust their expectations to the child’s changing abilities. If parents demand too much, making requests that the child is not mature enough to obey, they sabotage the educational process. Expectations beyond the child’s grasp will not stimulate development. Rather, the child must progress at his own pace, passing one by one through the various stages of childhood.

Three examples will illustrate our point:

1. Parents often don’t take play seriously enough. Rabbi Yisrael Salanter explains that when a child taking a bath pretends that a block of wood is a boat, and we take that block away from him, the child experiences the same trauma as an adult would feel if he owned a ship and it sunk. A child cares about his toy boat in exactly the same way as an adult would care about his ship. When we interfere with their playing for no good reason, we are hurting our children.

2. Certain expectations are so widespread and accepted that we don’t bother evaluating whether they are age-appropriate. For example, we expect our children to remain at the table throughout the Shabbos meals, even though these meals sometimes last for hours. A young child cannot sit quietly for so long. This is far beyond his ability. He must frolic. If we force him to sit, we are demanding behavior he is not capable of, and we do not need to explain how destructive this is. Our intentions are good: we want to build the child. However, a child cannot be built from demands he cannot satisfy. Instead, the child will be damaged. And that form of damage is especially devastating at a younger age, since interference with the planting process profoundly affects growth later on.

3. Parents sometimes push their children into aspects of prayer for which they are unprepared. There are schools today that, based on the advice of Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetsky, only teach young children morning blessings and Shema, and delay introducing them to more of the Siddur until age seven. Before seven years old, prayer is burdensome and children will do anything they can to escape it. By seven years old, most children can understand what prayer is and they are able to approach it with sufficient seriousness and respect. Children introduced to prayer at this stage don’t need to unlearn bad habits they might have picked up earlier, and consequently, they have an easier time relating properly to prayer for the rest of their lives.

Self-Improvement

Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin says that those who get angry easily are exempt from the obligation to rebuke inappropriate behavior. Since the Torah includes the instruction to educate our children in the more general commandment to give rebuke, it would seem to follow that those who anger easily would be exempt from the commandment to teach their children. However, they cannot be exempt from the commandment to teach their children, since ultimately a parent remains a parent, and a parent is by definition, an educator. There is no option here but to exercise self-control.

A person who does not work on improving his character cannot be a proper parent or teacher. This is not always easy. Parents and teachers must set aside time to develop themselves, especially their patience. One who lacks this trait certainly will not succeed at educating others.

The greatest parental obligation is to set a good example. Every child naturally wants to identify with his parents and imitate them. If parents set a sterling example and have a close, warm relationship with their children, then sons will want to be like their father and daughters will want to be like their mother. However, if parents demand of their children behavior or traits that the parents themselves don’t exhibit, the parents risk completely corrupting their children.

False Goals

Parents often act towards their children in a way they think is educational, but which, in reality, hasn’t the slightest connection to their children’s education. At the root of such behavior are selfish, egotistic motivations. Sometimes the parents are driven by completely evil emotions, traits that the parents would consider abhorrent if other adults displayed them. However, we might exhibit these very traits in our relationships with our children and consider them acceptable. They include: jealousy, dislike, pursuit of honor, anger, conceit, and especially a desire to control. Parents often want complete control over their children: “The child is mine, and I have the right to exercise unconditional authority over him.”

Here are a few examples of some evil emotions and what they can prompt us as parents to do:

Jealousy: If I see that the neighbor’s child helps his parents more than my child helps me, I feel jealous. I wonder: why doesn’t my child help more? Then, if I force my child to help more, I probably am not doing it for educational reasons (i.e., with a deep understanding of my child and what is appropriate for him), but simply because I am jealous of my neighbor and his child.

Honor seeking: If guests visit, I want my child to greet them nicely and behave pleasantly - not necessarily for the sake of my child’s growth, but so that my guests will compliment me on my superb job of childraising. Then I feel good.

Anger: I feel anger whenever someone goes against my will. When it comes to children, there is plenty of opportunity for anger since children often don’t behave exactly as we would like.

There are many other negative traits that we display in our relationships with our children. However, we try to conceal our real motivations behind the rationalization that what we are demanding is really “necessary for educational purposes.” If out of anger I strike my child, I might excuse myself by saying that it was “educationally necessary.” If out of jealousy of my neighbor I force my child to do something, I can fool myself into believing that this too was “educationally necessary.” If I want others to think highly of me through my dear child and, therefore, compel him to act in a particular fashion, this too I can justify as “educationally necessary.” In short, exercising total control over my child for entirely selfish reasons can be wrongly justified as necessary for his education.

When we deceive ourselves in this manner, the net result is that we don’t see the child for who he is. We see the child strictly as our property. We think that his purpose on earth is to benefit us, the parents. This is not to say that we parents don’t feel a responsibility to care for our children. We do. However, too often we care for them as we care for our property and do with them as we please.

We must recognize that pursuit of these selfishly motivated educational goals is not education at all. In fact, it often accomplishes the opposite.

Their Needs; Not Ours

Often parents place too much value on things that they lacked as children. Certainly their intention is good, but their unwavering determination can produce disastrous results. Just because a parent lacked something as a child does not mean that his child needs that same thing. Needs should be evaluated according to each child.

For example, parents who grew up in impoverished circumstances sometimes are determined that their children will never lack. They pour gifts upon them, often accompanied by a lot of concern and love. The children enthusiastically accept all the indulgent pampering, but it can ruin their character. G-d forbid, overindulgence often produces egoism and selfishness, as the Torah hints: “Yeshurun became fat and rebelled.”

Their Dreams; Not Ours

In a similar vein, sometimes a parent who failed to earn the status he dreamed of in his youth - being a Torah scholar, communal authority, or honored professional - tries to vicariously fulfill himself through his child. He decides, “My child will achieve what I did not!” However, the child, poor thing, might have different natural talents that would better be used in a different field. The child even might have started down his own path and might be experiencing real growth and success, and still the parent tries to crush his inborn inclinations. The parent spiritually strangles the child by repeating, “You will be a person of stature, you will learn what I never learned and will reach heights that I never reached!” The child is torn between his own nature and his desire to make his parents happy. What he is fit to do, his parents won’t allow him to pursue. That which his parents force upon him, he has no interest in. The result is failure.

Certainly, we think, his way should be our way! And we set out to make it so.

Prayer

Our primary obligation as parents is to pray for our children, and this obligation begins even before they are born.

We can never pray enough for our children. The obligation is infinite. Our Sages did not prescribe any particular petition. Instead, we are given the opportunity to pour out our hearts in prayer, and so we must do, each of us composing our own personal entreaty. Our words should address the moment’s needs and concerns.¹

Prayer is perhaps the most important ingredient for a successful education. We are deceiving ourselves if we think that our children’s future rests in our hands alone. Everything depends on the Holy One. However, our children have been deposited with us, and we must do everything we can for our precious trusts, including praying for them frequently.

Customized Education

Parents need to recognize their child’s unique character. No two children are alike. If parents assume one child is the same as another, and as a result they mistakenly believe that one child has abilities that he really does not, all their educational efforts may prove to be counterproductive.

King Solomon teaches us (Mishlei 22,6): “Educate a child according to his own way, and then when he grows old, he won’t depart from it.” To educate a child, one must first uncover and evaluate the child’s “own way.”

We all know that a banana plant and an apple tree require different treatment. If we take care of a banana plant and an apple tree in the same way, at best, one of them won’t flourish, and it is possible that neither will bear fruit. So, too, with children. We must try to understand the child’s individual personality and take it into account when making all our educational decisions.

On the verse in Mishlei mentioned above, the Vilna Gaon comments:

The Gaon’s comments offer great insight into raising children: A physically active child cannot be transformed into someone who sits and reads twenty hours a day. If we force such a child to sit, we could actually damage him. Moreover, even if we succeed at physically controlling the child in the short term, that control is entirely external. The child will remain internally unchanged. Then, when he is old enough to flee our influence, his real inclination will resurface and he will indulge in it, behaving however he likes, abandoning the ill-suited education we tried to foist upon him.

The Gaon concludes:

If we force a child down a path inappropriate for his personality, he will listen now and we won’t detect the damage we have done. But much later, when he matures and no longer fears us, then he will stop listening. This is a fundamental educational principle.

Some parents transgress by forcing their child against his nature, and their mistake has horrible consequences. I remember once when an outstanding Torah scholar brought his son to see me. The scholar explained that his boy suffered from shyness. Indeed, the boy didn’t speak. When questioned, he refused to answer. Later, however, I discovered that the silence was not a product of shyness. The father, in his great “righteousness,” didn’t permit his children to leave the house. He didn’t even let them play. After all, “the children must learn Torah,” and play is “a waste of time.” The child was consumed with hatred for his father.

I never succeeded in removing the hatred from that child’s heart. When he grew up, he left Judaism entirely and married a secular woman. And all this flowed from a well-intentioned education, directed toward producing another great Torah scholar. The father’s tragic error was his failure to take into account children’s nature in general and this specific child’s personality. Such an approach often produces horrible results.

Long-Term Education

• Creating the Bond

Ideally, our educational strategy should be a long-term plan. Parents must build a powerfully warm bond with their children while they are still young, so that even the stress of adolescence cannot break it. When the child is only two or three years old, we should already be laying the groundwork for handling the child’s contrariness at age fourteen or fifteen - and this is only done by building intimacy and trust.

Generally, we should not make too many demands on our children. However, we must be careful to stand by whatever demands we make. Once parents decide that a request is appropriate and necessary, and they articulate that request, then they must stand firm. They must fully expect the child to accept the request. Of course, the request must be made in a wise manner - to obviate the need to hit or scream, while inspiring the child to honor the request.

Harshness: Educational Myopia

When parents relate harshly to their two, three or four year-old child - when they hit the child or make demands beyond the child’s abilities - they destroy the likelihood of ever building the crucial, warm relationship their child will desperately need to have with them in a decade.

Harshness is insidious, for the distance it produces is not always immediately apparent. The toddler still needs his parents. But later, when the child reaches his teenage years, parents begin to complain, “I don’t understand what’s with my child. He never talks with me. He never shares anything with me. I have no idea what’s going on with him.” When parents experiencing this rejection approach me for advice, I often ask, “Tell me, did you strike the child when he was two or three?” The parent usually responds, “Of course, but only for the sake of the child’s education.” Then I must offer the painful explanation, “Now you are paying for the blows you gave him back then.” The blows and harsh treatment seethe in the child’s subconscious, often without even the child’s awareness. The events remained concealed within the child’s soul until adolescence reveals the deep wounds. Usually too late, parents realize that they have damaged their relationship with the child. For the parents, this is terribly painful. For the child this is terribly destructive.

Sometimes it seems that we get better short-term results using a harsh approach, but “the wise man looks ahead.” Parents who know the secret of providing a lasting education – a long-term perspective – will be careful not to be seduced by the promise of immediate results.

Often when a child won’t listen, parents deliver a few blows to elicit instant obedience, and then congratulate themselves, “Ah, we know how to get results!” This is a very premature celebration. Parents might pay for their rashness when their child turns fourteen or fifteen years old, and then it will be extremely difficult to repair the damage.

Punishment

This is a topic that interests many people. To my distress, there is a widespread belief that punishment is the most important educational tool available to both parents and teachers.

Fascination with punishment stems from parents’ desire to control their children. A person feels that as long as he has the ability to punish, he also has control. Schoolteachers often feel this way too.

Such an approach is totally perverse and unworthy of professional educators; the same is true for parents. The “When should I punish?” perspective is corrupt and undermines all prospects for a healthy education.

One might argue that Jewish sources approve of punishment. An explicit verse even warns us, “He that spares his rod hates his child.” Many people feel this verse requires us to beat our children.

Elsewhere, however, we find another verse: “And I took for myself two rods; the one I called pleasantness and the other I called beating, and I herded the flock” (Zacharia 11:7). The verse mentions two rods: one that we use to beat, and another that we can also use to educate, but through pleasantness – the rod of pleasantness. We must recognize that the rod of pleasantness is also a rod, but it causes no pain. When I offer encouragement, this too is a rod. If a child performs well and I give him a piece of chocolate, this is also a rod, but it is a rod of pleasantness.

When we read the verse, “He that spares his rod hates his child,” we must remember that there are two sorts of rods – violent ones, and pleasant ones. Why read the verse as a requirement to beat a child, when there are other ways – better ways – to encourage and guide the child’s growth?

We cannot imagine how much we damage a child when we strike him. Rabbi Eliyahu Lopian once instructed me, “We only deal with children in a pleasant way.” He told me that late in life he came to regret the few spankings he had given his children when they were young. Rabbi Lopian raised eleven children, many of whom headed leading yeshivos later on – and he rejected spanking.

In this regard, I want to add a personal observation. The Gemora (Kiddushin 30) records a discussion about the age when it is no longer suitable to spank a child: is it age sixteen or twenty-four? The Gemora gives the reason why striking older children is prohibited: The parent is putting a stumbling block in front of his child since the child might rebel and attempt to strike back at the parent. Today, we find that a parent who even strikes a three year old is putting a stumbling block before him. The child’s rebellion is visible; he clearly wants to hit back. Often the child will raise his fist in response, but he can’t reach up to his parent’s cheek. There is only frantic motion, but the meaning of that motion is clear. The child has been driven to rebel, and the ramifications of this rebellion must be taken into account.

In previous generations the situation was different. Children were more tolerant and could more easily accept a spanking. Children also had a more positive self-image and were not so badly damaged by a few blows. Today, however, our children’s whole environment is suffused with rebellion.

If a parent tries to subdue his child with a beating, he can damage the child and his relationship with the child. Then, when the child matures, he will close himself off from his parents and it will already be too late to rebuild a trusting, open relationship.

Harsh Language

Another technique as destructive as spanking, or perhaps even worse, is yelling. When a parent screams at his child, bystanders can easily detect the child’s terror. Screaming so powerfully affects the child’s nerves that he begins to shake. It is much worse than a light spanking.

Of course, it is sometimes difficult for a parent to restrain himself. We can imagine such a scenario: A father comes home late, tired and hungry. The children, seeing their father for the first time since morning, begin clamoring for his attention. The mother is also exhausted. Her temper is short. It is bedtime, but despite the mother’s aggravated insistence, the children refuse to go to bed. The father, influenced by the rising tide of anger in the household, raises his voice too. Under such circumstances, staying in control of oneself is very difficult. Still, one must remember that screaming does serious damage.

In the early nineteenth century, Rabbi Chaim Volozhin declared, “These days, people will not listen to harsh language.” If we speak to people harshly, they cannot hear what we are saying. People only hear soft, pleasant language. We have no choice but to speak softly. Rabbi Chaim Volozhin concluded, “And someone whose nature makes it difficult for him to speak softly, or who angers easily when others misbehave or refuse to listen, is exempt from the commandment to offer rebuke.” This was Rabbi Chaim Volozhin’s ruling over 140 years ago: One who angers easily cannot rebuke another. How much more applicable is Rabbi Chaim’s ruling today, especially when it comes to disciplining children.

Threats

Threats impair growth and should, therefore, be avoided. This is not to say that we should never place demands on our child, or that we should give in to our child whenever he throws a tantrum. We must do what is right regardless of pressure from the child. Still, we don’t want to give our children the impression that they are living in a threatening environment. We should find a positive way to transmit our requests. This is infinitely better than the negative approach, the threatening approach.

What should we do when a child doesn’t listen? We should express our request repeatedly and in different ways until the child hears and appreciates what we are asking. This is part of the wisdom of education: knowing how to speak and when to speak.

Parents must watch how they speak. A child can be adversely affected by hearing an inappropriate word or dishonorable expression even once. Also, a child is quite sensitive to his parents’ relationship with each other. He hears screaming. He notices anger. It is impossible to calculate precisely how spiritually destructive an improper example can be.

The Shabbos Table

Shabbos should be pleasant, and not oppressive…. There are those parents who insist on their children’s presence at the table the whole time and like to show off how well-trained their children are. This is inadvisable.

When children reach an appropriate age to stay at the table, we can attract them with beautiful stories about the weekly parasha, or stories about tzaddikim, or anything else that creates a fascinating experience and draws them into the event. Children should yearn for Shabbos.

It is also possible to include the children in the Shabbos preparations, not in a fashion which makes the child feel burdened, and not just to lighten the parents’ responsibilities, but to interest them and give them a feeling that they are “big children,” responsible, and partners with their parents.

Help and Kindness

The child’s training in kindness also begins in the home. It is very important to accustom the child to helping out around the house. Of course, when dealing with small children, their contributions must be modest, and as they mature, so, too, the kindnesses they perform at home should grow.

It is not productive to force children to do acts of kindness that they dislike. Unpleasant assignments won’t inspire the child to independently want to help in the future. Rather, we must make helping people out into a cheerful experience.

Earlier, we mentioned one effective technique for accomplishing this: Make the child feel like your partner while he is assisting you, so he will feel good about himself and the kindness he is doing. If you include your child in your chores, this gives him a boost in his self-image. Since assisting his parents raises the child’s stature in his eyes, he happily volunteers and gets accustomed to helping others. In large families this process usually happens naturally, with the older children taking care of the younger ones. The older children spontaneously begin to take responsibility for their younger siblings and help them when they need it. This is exemplary education.

Questions

Every child eventually begins to ask questions. A child’s questions must be treated seriously and addressed directly. If we constantly respond to questions saying things like, “You can’t understand this,” “You’ll understand when you’re older,” or “Don’t ask such silly questions,” then we stunt the child’s natural inquisitiveness. The child wants to know, but instead of developing this curiosity, we crush it.

We should celebrate the fact that our child asks questions, and we should answer in a manner that matches the child’s level of comprehension. When the parents find themselves unable to answer the child’s questions, they should do their best to find out and then provide serious, satisfying answers.

Learning

What should we do when our child doesn’t want to learn? The Gemara answers:  “In Usha they established that a man should roll with his child until twelve years old, and then get tough with him.” What does it mean to “roll with” one’s child? Rashi explains: “If he doesn’t want to learn, roll pleasantly with him, with soft words.” Persuade him. Entice him. The Talmud recommends that we take this soft approach until age twelve. Of course, today the age has changed, and what was once only appropriate until age twelve is now appropriate until age twenty. Until age twenty we must “roll with” our child.

Rebuke

Earlier we referred to the Talmudic discussion about the age when a child is no longer fit for rebuke: either sixteen or twenty-four.1 Me’iri strikes an interesting compromise, explaining that the ideal age for rebuke is between sixteen and twenty-four years old.

Rebuke consists of clarification. We must clarify to a child, and especially to a young adult, what constitutes good behavior. We should stress the child’s great, perhaps unrealized potential, helping them recognize their personal strengths. Me’iri writes that ages sixteen to twenty-four are ideal for this sort of clarification. Of course, rebuke is necessary even before age sixteen. But the ideal window of opportunity - the period when one can best speak openly and deeply about personal issues - is this eight-year slot.

Education is a huge responsibility. A parent’s whole mission in this world is to guard the precious trust the Holy One gave him - to raise his children well, with all his strength, and to understand the responsibility parents have to set a good example.

We parents must learn how to transmit to our child the soul of the Torah, not just rote behavior or technical instruction about how to act. By “soul,” we mean the joy, beauty, and splendor of fulfilling a mitzva; we mean the taste of a mitzva. We must show our children their purpose and mission in this world. We must open their eyes to the wonders of creation as well. When we plant emuna like this in a child, there is hope that the child will become someone who independently yearns to grow through the study of Torah and performance of mitzvos. When he himself wants to grow, then we have hit the center of the educational target.

Education is compared to lighting the menora in the Temple. “When you lift up the flames,” the verse says; and Rashi comments: The pilot torch must be held in place until the flames rise independently from the menora’s lamp. A parent must ignite the soul of his child so that the flames of love for Torah burn on their own.

¹ A general formula exists, passed down to us from the Chazon Ish. Many people include this formula in their Shemoneh Esrei, and/or recite it after Shabbos and Yom Tov candle lighting:  May it be Your Will Hashem, my G-d and G-d of my forefathers, that You have mercy on my child [name of son/daughter], and that You move his/her heart to love and fear Your Name, and to learn diligently Your holy Torah. May You push away anything that could interfere with his/her diligent study of Your holy Torah and provide those circumstances that will lead him/her to study Your holy Torah. For you hear the prayer of Your People, Israel, with compassion.

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